Two top artificial intelligence experts--one an optimist and the other more alarmist about the technology's future--engaged in a spirited debate at the TIME100 Summit on Wednesday. Both Yoshua Bengio, founder and scientific director of Mila Quebec AI Institute, a scientific hub, and Eric Schmidt, chairman of the Special Competitive Studies Project and former Google CEO, agree that A.I. is poised to transform modern society. But as moderator Stephanie Ruhle, an MSNBC host, put it: "Yoshua believes that the risk of AI potentially putting us into extinction should be considered a global risk, like we look at pandemics and nuclear war. Eric is super, super excited about AI." Bengio's main concern with AI is the difficulty in ensuring that AI systems are used for their intended purpose and not something harmful. "We absolutely need to clear the fog; right now, scientists really have no idea" how to get AI to behave according to the norms, law and values of society.

Whether this is a serious concern yet depends on how good current deepfake technology is and how good people are at discerning fakes from the real thing. Most fans were thrilled to see a digital cameo from a young Luke Skywalker in The Mandalorian. But he didn't look real, which for some was unnerving. Deepfake Luke recently appeared again in The Book of Boba Fett, just about a year later, looking impressively realistic. Creating digital actors for TV shows is relatively harmless. But the power to create convincing deepfakes of world leaders, for example, could severely destabilize society.

I also believe that part of what makes us human is our ability to thrive in moments of in between - let our minds wander while we stand in line, have the next great idea while sitting on the subway, and meeting someone new while waiting for a movie to start. Algorithms are targeting these moments of "emptiness" to keep us busy, trying to keep us entertained, always. Their biggest opportunity of growth is those times that we have "available." By creating algorithms that keep us constantly occupied and never bored, consuming content they know we'll like, we're creating a word that is quite dark, at least in my opinion.